Chapter 7 – The Core

Facility IX – Reception Area

Nytus rose unsteadily to his feet, his ears ringing and his senses reeling from the shockwave, his ribs hurting from the impact with which he had struck the ground. He shouldered his autogun and turned dizzily, pointing the weapon down the East corridor. His vision swam, the walls and floors moved, sinking into each other as he tried to regain his equilibrium. Sounds were tinny and distorted, though the warning sirens pierced through the confusion like painful needles in his ears. The heat that emanated from the East corridor was that of an oven. Civilians groaned and coughed, pulling each other to their feet, holding each other up and moving drunkenly away from the source of the explosion. Private Lander stumbled into view, the back of his flak-jacket smouldering. He fell to one knee. The medic, Bota, scampered over scattered debris to aid him.

Next, Nytus heard the quick tapping of fingers on keys. Administrator Kress was accessing the control panel at the desk. Her hair was slightly ruffled, but otherwise she still looked clean and neat. "The Core is still intact," she said over her shoulder to the approaching Rozen.

"Good," he replied, his voice distant and indistinct, "then we can still protect it."

Nytus staggered to the control panel, to the equipment he had set up and linked to the facility's security systems. Multiple warning lights were flashing, making quiet little ticking sounds as they did so. Perimeter alarms, North and West, and another notification that a system had malfunctioned. The remote gate controls were shot and the main gate was open. The place had suddenly become indefensible. Nytus shook himself to regain his senses, urgently gleaning all of the information he could from his hack-job setup.

One pict-feed still showed a picture. It was from the North, where the hill rose sharply beyond the perimeter fence. Figures flocked to it, climbing with ropes and grapples, the electrified bars now useless. He cursed, it was now only a matter of time before they were overrun.

"Sir," he said to Rozen, "the facility is compromised, we have no defences, we cannot hold it."

Rozen turned to look at him with a surprising and furious intensity.

"We will defend the core, Nytus," he said, each word clear and precise. "That is our mission."

"With respect, Sir," replied Nytus, groggy from the explosion, "the main gate is open, there are multiple perimeter breaches, the Multessans are swarming from the North, and by all accounts there is an even worse enemy at our backs. The facility is lost..."

"The facility is not lost," came Administrator Kress' voice, her expression cold.

Nytus pointed at the wave of bodies pressing into the North side of the enclosure on the surviving pict-feed. As he continued to speak, his voice gained volume. He ignored the administrator, his attentions solely on Sergeant Rozen. "There are three of us left, Sir, we cannot hope to defend against a wave like that. Our only sane course of action now is to try to get the civilians out of here. We are duty bound to protect the citizens of Abora..."

"We are bound to our mission, soldier. I will not allow this facility to be compromised" Rozen argued.

Nytus' anger flared, he gestured at the chaos around him with wide arms. "The facility is compromised, sergeant," he roared, "there are things inside here, with us, you know this, they got Hasken, they got Hein, they probably got Jagg, Kimura and Ridge too..."

"Do not think to manipulate me with a list of casualties, Nytus," Rozen interjected. "I am well aware of who we have lost. Our enemy is outside, and our mission is to guard that core." Astea Kress was standing next to him like an advocate.

"Even if that were the case," Nytus continued, his voice now tense but quieter, as if trying to diffuse a hostage situation. "Even if all we had to contend with was the insurgents, the main gate is opened, the main door has been destroyed, the three of us cannot possibly hope to hold off that wave."

Rozen stepped close to Nytus now, the former Guardsman looming over his PDF counterpart. Nytus stared back, his head high. He looked directly back into Rozen's eyes. There was something there. Maybe. Some flash of colour.

Rozen spoke with finality.

"We will defend the core, Nytus. Astea and I are going to get as close as we can to the generator room. Once we have assessed the situation we will return. In the meantime, you and Private Lander will hold this position. That is an order."

Nytus bowed his head.

"Yes, Sir."

"Mattius," said Astea when they were out of earshot of the others, her dazzling eyes reflecting with a blue fire. "I fear that your men are no longer reliable. Unlike you, they have proved unable to stay true under the … extreme pressures of the situation. I think that they will attempt to leave the facility."

Sergeant Rozen stopped, his disfiguring head wound gleamed in the light of the distant flames. "What would you have me do?" he said, his eyes dull.

She smiled, urging him to keep walking. "I said something to you before," she started as a smaller, secondary explosion shook the earth and sent a wave of searing heat past them. "I said that no unworthy soul must be allowed into the core."

Rozen nodded as he started to walk again. The grip on his lasgun became loose..

"Well you are no unworthy soul, Mattius," she spoke, her smile widening, her voice like honey, "you are a fine man, a magnificent soldier, you have fought and seen things that those others in your unit would never be able to understand. You are worthy, Mattius. You can defend the core."

"But how do we get to it," he said, "the generator room is an inferno."

She held out a fine, slim, comforting hand, "let me lead you," she said, "I will take you there."

She led him into the fire.

"Private Lander," Nytus said, "can you still fight."

The huge soldier waved off the attentions of Bota and got to his feet, grimacing in pain as the straps of the heavy stubber pressed against the burned skin on the back of his neck.

"Ready and willing, Sir," he said through gritted teeth.

"The transport we came in on should still be near the guard tower. Judging by the distance from here to the North perimeter fence we might just have time to get it running again and get these civilians out of here before the Mutts swarm us. I think the cooling was shot, I should be able to repair it." He looked at Lander with regret in his eyes. "I am sorry to put you in this position, Private, but something strange is happening in this facility and I believe that Sergeant Rozen has been compromised. Are you with me, Private Lander?"

Lander looked at Bota, whose big eyes stared back.

"I'm with you, Sir," he said.

"Then we're moving, now," Nytus said quickly, and handed Lander his autogun, "gather everyone, arm who you can, we are going to make a break for that transport."

As the bedraggled group of terrified civilians hurried up the track towards the guard tower, the first light of dawn was breaking over the mountains. The storm had died down, and as the low clouds turned from black to grey, it seemed like a different world. The winds had given way to an odd stillness. The jungle, damaged and torn by the fearsome storm, hung in silence, it's fauna seemingly cowed into inactivity by the ferocity of the explosion that had erupted in Facility IX. The smoke from the burning fuel poured out of the ruptured roof of the facility behind them, and blossomed straight up in a thick, black coil that loomed over the landscape like a dreadful tower.

They turned the corner in the track, around the patch of forest where Private Ridge had breathed his last, and the transport came into view, dwarfed by the guard tower that stood silently next to it. The transport was exactly how they'd left it, it's menacing front grille leering at them as they approached, its windscreen smashed. Beyond it, the tall gate was standing open.

Nytus opened the passenger door of the transport, and grabbed a toolbox from beneath the footwell. He turned around to see the enormous frame of Lander, with Bota close by, appearing laughably small next to him. She was holding the pistol that she had used to fire at Lander in the med-bay. Behind them, one of the older, male facility workers was holding Nytus' autogun.

"We'll need them to take up positions along this bank," Nytus said to Lander, pointing at the high, muddy verge that ran parallel with the road.

"I'll cover the main gate," Lander said, the burns on the back of his head and neck clearly visible in the growing light, "I've got four drums of ammo, should be able to hold it for a while."

"Good, go on," Nytus said, then started to take off his jacket.

"If you can't get this truck going fast, Nytus, we're going to be overrun out here," Lander added, looking back as he walked away.

"I know," said Nytus grimly. He sent Lander a respectful nod, the huge soldier returned it.

After he'd gone, a voice came from the other side of the transport, near the guard tower. It was one of the civvies.

"There's someone over here!"

Nytus and Bota shared urgent glances. They hurried around the bulky transport to see a small group of civilians gathered around the entrance to the guard tower. Nytus pushed them aside, and saw a familiar form slumped in the doorway.

"Throne..." Nytus breathed, "is that you, Jaggy?"

"He can't walk," said Bota after quickly examining his wound. The blood-stained bandage had been carefully applied, but it was so saturated now that it was becoming an infection risk in itself. Jagg looked terrible, his face pale and stained with crimson, his left eye shot through with red, the hair on the left side of his head was matted with blood and dirt.

Nytus leaned in close, moving urgently, holding Jagg's chin up as he tried to get the wounded soldier to focus. "Private, what happened out here? Who tended to your wound?"

Jagg lolled groggily, he looked to be on the verge of unconsciousness, his senses impaired by blood-loss, pain meds, and trauma. He tried to look at Nytus but his eyes seemed unable to focus. "Ed...Edora," he replied, his voice slurred and tired. Nytus cursed quietly, shaking his head.

He noticed that Jagg's long-las was next to him, as if he had been dragging it along the floor with him.

"Can you still shoot?" Nytus said. Jagg's eyes widened momentarily, as if he was trying to fight through his drug-trance.

"Yes … Sir..."

Nytus turned to Bota and nodded, she nodded back.

"Right," he said, "listen to me, we're going to get you set up on the bank over there. Mutts are going to be coming out of the trees, and I'm going to need you to put them down, with this, alright?" he tapped the long-las. "This is what you do, Jaggy, alright? Just do what you do. We're going to get out of here, I just need you to help fend them off for as long as you can."

"You … got it, Sir," Jagg managed, then his face contorted with pain as Nytus and Bota lifted him and started to carry him to the bank, his leg dangling uselessly.

The flames in the generator room were a frenetic, boiling orange-red that was tinted here and there with roiling clouds of enchanted blue and mystic purple. The explosion had wrought the metal of the walkway and railings into sinister, twisted curves and spikes, silhouetted black against the flames. The fires burned amidst the husks of ruined generators, leaping out from underground as if a portal to some fiery dimension loomed beneath. At the far end of the generator room, where a red-lit doorway stood at the top of some metal stairs, the fire did not burn. The flames parted, creating a path all the way there. It bloomed at the sides like a parted sea, and crossed overhead, where the dancing tips of the flames mixed with belching black smoke. It was as if some unseen force made a tunnel through the inferno, inviting him further.

Astea smiled back as she stepped onto the path of unnaturally twisted metal, and he felt compelled to follow. He felt the heat on his skin, and a billowing, hot wind that blew from the door at the stop of the stairs, swirling and carrying flakes of smouldering ash in hypnotic circles. Booms and clangs echoed over the roar of the flames as generators gave in and smaller fuel reserves went up.

In the patches of blue fire, Rozen saw shapes and images swirl and merge into things that he recognised. He saw old enemies, lost loves, comrades and planetscapes. He saw the mutant spawn that had ambushed his squad on Rykker IV, and raked his head with foul, barbed tentacles, disfiguring him for life. He saw the hulking, leering form of the Ork that had removed his arm in the brutal close combat melee on the fields of Elysir. Behind these images, creatures lurked, formed of elongated limbs and gaping maws, and barking strange, coughing laughter.

He was vaguely aware that he should fear these creatures. He made to raise his lasgun and blast the heretical figments back to the warp. Only, he had dropped his weapon. He could not remember it happening. He walked on. He stepped over the burned husk of what might have been Private Hein.

He felt a looming presence, an alien sentiment was in the air, an eagerness that leapt like the flames all around him. Soft, whispered words invaded his mind.

Lander set his feet firmly in the mud at the foot of the gate. He looked out as the morning gradually broke over the sweeping hills, the white stone of distant peaks coming into view despite the low, grey cloud. The vista was breathtaking, he breathed it in, absorbed it as if it was the final sunrise he would ever see.

The sound of engines snapped him back to reality. He turned to watch the paths that meandered up into the high, wild places to the North. The insurgents were coming on their bikes, and likely many more on foot. The corpses of their comrades littered the side of the track from the day before, picked at by birds and other wildlife in the night. Lander guessed that the Mutts had been attracted by the explosion, and the gouts of black smoke. They would have been able to see and feel the affects no matter where their camp was hidden up in the mountains. This made sense, but he wondered if there was another answer.

He had a hunch that their presence was part of some greater plan that was unfolding before his eyes.

When the first glint of metal was glimpsed through spindly, leaning trunks, Private Lander gripped the trigger of the heavy stubber, and the morning jungle erupted with a deafening, rapid-fire roar, the air heated by flying bullets. Leaves were shredded and trunks were reducewd flying splinters as Lander rained high calibre ordnance on the Multessan's approach. Bodies fell as if their puppet strings had been cut. Fuel tanks ignited in sudden, blinding blazes.

The insurgents started to return fire, the hollow cackle of rickety, automatic gunfire was pathetic next to the boom of the heavy stubber, but Lander knew that any wayward shot could prove fatal. He kept firing until the firing mechanism clicked, then he stepped back casually behind the giant fence post, dropped the empty drum, and reloaded.

Bota lay on the muddy bank, pointing her pistol at the shapes in the trees. She felt frozen, haunted, shell-shocked, terrified. She squeezed the trigger, hitting nothing. Bullets flew back towards her, zipping off into the air, striking the mud in front of her, rebounding off of the truck. She peeked over the bank to see a ragged insurgent breaking the cover of the trees. She closed one eye, looked down the sight, and popped off a shot. He kept coming, she felt useless, completely ineffectual.

She whimpered, her little pistol was a joke in this gunfight. This was a battle, and she was a poorly armed, untrained medic.

The sound of autogun fire next to her shocked and deafened. The facility worker that had taken Nytus' weapon popped his head up and fired off a burst, and the insurgent Bota had been aiming at went down, his legs shot out from under him. The facility worker ducked out of sight, holding the autogun to his chest, breathing quick, panicked breaths and closing his eyes.

"Hey, civvy," came the voice of the PDF soldier they had found in the guard tower doorway. He leaned backwards, a groggy smile on his face. He was addressing the worker with the autogun. Despite his desperate shape, Bota could see that he was handsome. "You need to keep … keep firing ..." he said in a woozy, breathy tone, "that's for s-suppressive fire … it'll keep them back ..."

The facility worker nodded and poked the autogun over the top of the bank, squeezing the trigger. The rapid fire caused approaching insurgents to take cover.

Jagg swung himself back around and lifted his weapon. He felt so weak, the long-las felt so heavy. He moved the sight to his eye and tried to focus, blinking rapidly. He saw a moving body and pulled the trigger, the recoil caused him to swing back, the lucky Mutt stumbled, clutching his arm. Jagg swayed back into position and got another in his sights. He fired and the shot went wide, the phosphorescent beam zipping off into the air, burning through leaves and branches.

"Come on," he whispered to himself, "...get it together."

He fired again, this time the long-las round struck one of the firing insurgents in the chest, blazing through the hapless Mutt's torso and flinging him back into the mud and undergrowth with violent force.

Jagg blinked and slowly, shakily, lowered himself back into cover with a groggy smirk. The long-las hissed as the heat sink did its work.

Nytus cursed to himself, but the word went unheard under the sounds of various weapons firing in unison. He was cursing at the state of the engine. The cooling system was shot through, he'd have to plug it somehow. Whatever repair he was likely to manage, it wasn't going to be permanent. He grabbed a wrench and started hammering at the housing, abundantly aware that the survival of the civilians was in his hands. He was aware of bodies falling around the truck, and cries of pain and fear. He had to shut them out for now.

Facility IX – Core

Astea and Sergeant Rozen left the twisted metal and fire and cackling figures of the generator behind. Though the earth still shook from the destruction, this place seemed quiet in comparison. This dark, confined corridor that led through to the core. They had passed the red warning lights and now, as the door to the artefact came into view, a billowing golden glow lured them in. Rozen squinted into the darkness, and the glow seemed to form … letters, or runes, around the door.

"What are those?" Rozen said dully.

Astea smiled next to him as she walked with grace and direction. "They are wards," she said, "to keep our Lord inside."

"Our … Lord?" Rozen repeated.

She turned to him, held his cheek like a lover. She looked into his eyes, one of them was steel-blue, the other a surging, ethereal, deep cerulean.

"Your unit, Mattius, so ripe for manipulation," she said, her words honeyed by her sultry tone and practised accent, "so much fear, so much unruliness. An untapped psyker, did you know about her? A dangerous criminal, you must have know about him. And you, who has seen so much, Mattius. You are a hero of the Imperium of Man, but it has affected you, hasn't it, sweet Mattius. You are dead inside."

"I am," he said.

"Go, Mattius, open the door and be renewed. Our Lord, Sumari'thar, awaits."

Sergeant Rozen looked at the door. Beyond the small circle of glass, something looked back at him, a face, barely there, like a vision from another reality. The visage made his mortal soul recoil, it defied the senses, its eyes stared through him from across the void.

Rozen, his mind not his own, stepped up to the door. He pulled off his glove, and placed his hand on the control panel.

There was a hiss of ancient machinery, a creak of grinding metal. Astea's face lit up with a manic smile.

The Multessans were closing in. The civilians' meagre defence could not hold them back. One of the facility workers who had been firing from the cover of the transport with a scavenged autopistol had been shot in the hand, tearing half of it away and leaving a messy stump dripping with blood. He now mewled in the back of the truck. Bota put the last of her bullets into her measly pistol as she took cover from the incoming fire. There was a cry from next to her. She glanced to her right just in time to see two tiny blood fountains explode from the chest of the man with the autogun. He fell straight back, dead before he hit the ground.

She was numb now, acting on instinct, all sense and reason switched off in this bullet-soaked hell. She slid down and grabbed the autogun, then reached over the bank and pulled the trigger. The recoil almost broke her wrist. She cursed and gripped the gun harder, and tried again, rattling off a round into the approaching bodies. Their numbers were increasing, they were beginning to realise that their enemy were drastically outnumbered, and not as effective as they might have expected. They advanced with reckless confidence.

"We can't hold them!" she yelled to Nytus, tears in her eyes. Nytus was working frantically under the transport. He did not reply.

Jagg let off another shot, a white-hot cylinder of light piercing a Multessan body at incredible velocity, cauterising the wound before it had a chance to bleed. He brought the sight up again but they were getting too close. Her cursed, remembering that he'd given his pistol to one of the civilians. He realised that he needed to move.

He winced as he dragged himself painfully along the top of the bank, trying to give himself a better firing position. The movement made him feel sick and dizzy. He lifted the long-las again, it seemed to become heavier with each shot. He blinked as his vision blurred. He took another shot. This one glanced a leg. The Mutt fell but was already scrabbling back up. Jagg's accuracy was getting worse.

"Come on, Jaggy," he said to himself.

The stray bullet came from the tree line and penetrated his skull just above the right eye, causing his head to flick back with neck-breaking force and spattering blood in an arc as he fell. His limp body slid down the muddy bank and came to rest on the track, his long-las clattering down next to him.

Bota watched him fall and backed away, her courage failing.

Nytus hammered the rigged cam belt into place and let it go, looking at it briefly, making sure it would not fall away.

"That'll have to do," he said to himself as he dragged himself out from beneath the truck on the drivers' side, leaving the scattered tools on the ground. He leaned into the doorway and reached the ignition. "Come on," he murmured. The engine coughed, spluttered, and died. He cursed loudly, and tried again.

Again the engine failed.

He kicked the tyre, his face creased into a snarl.

Not here. Not like this.

"Come on!" he yelled with fury.

He pulled the ignition. There was a metallic cough, the transport lurched forward, and then a continuous, rattling hum as the engine stayed running.

"Emperor be praised," he breathed, then yelled to the others at the top of his voice. "Get into the transport, we are leaving!"

As he rounded the cab to fire his pistol at the advancing insurgents, he spied Private Jagg's body lying in the dirt. His heart sank, but there was no time to mourn yet another comrade lost. He guided Bota as she climbed frantically into the cab, and then made to climb in himself.

When the bullet hit, the force took him from his feet. He smashed into the side of the truck, his senses reeling.

Lander was on his third ammunition drum. The insurgents couldn't get close, his firepower vastly outclassing anything they had to offer. That is, until the insurgents carrying the rusted, crudely built missile launchers came into view.

Lander turned his arc around, aiming up into the edge of the forests where the missile launcher troops had appeared. They were ragged but dangerous, their bald heads were painted with dark symbols. The first missile whistled and curled overhead, leaving a trail of black smoke behind it. It impacted at the top of the gate, wrenching the metal and showering him with shrapnel. The insurgent who had fired the missile was cut down by a hail of stubber rounds in the next moment, but by then the second Mutt had fired his shot.

The warhead hit the ground in front of him, showering him with dirt and throwing him back through the gate with concussive force. He landed badly, jarring his left arm. His weapon swung fiercely and was dashed against the ground, the strap almost strangling him. He rose groggily, spitting mud and leaf matter from his mouth, and lifted the heavy stubber. Unperturbed, he strode back to his position, walking into the drifting smoke billowing from the small crater. He peered out into the tree-line, and pulled the trigger.

There was a soft click.

Lander cursed. The firing mechanism had failed. The violent fall must have knocked something out of line. No time to fix it now. With regret, he unclipped the heavy weapon and let it fall to the earth, and then he realised that he'd handed his autopistol to one of the facility workers.

There was a sick feeling in his stomach as he reached down to his boot and pulled out his combat knife. The odds had swung the other way.

They rushed out of the crater smoke, firing wildly and brandishing rusty bayonets. A bullet winged his leg as he charged back. He ignored it. He piled into his first opponent, knocking into him on the edge of the crater and overpowering him with sheer size and weight, then he swung his blade around as he rose, slitting the throat of another. The Mutt fell back, clutching weakly at his neck, but even as he did so more of his comrades dashed in and around the smoke, advancing like pack animals. This close, Lander could see their oddly coloured eyes, and other, stranger things. One had too many fingers, another had a forked tongue lolling from a too-wide mouth.

One of them had a rusted, mean-looking trench shotgun. Lander lunged for him. He wasn't quick enough, the blast caused a spread of shrapnel wounds across his belly. He coughed and knelt, blood bubbling in his mouth.

He brandished the combat knife. They whooped as they rushed him, overpowering, swarming, stabbing and stabbing until the titan finally fell.

Nytus' right arm leaked blood. He grimaced as he used it to push Bota's head down in the passenger seat next to him. The bullet that had struck him seemed to have passed right through. He was losing blood quickly, and the pain was intense, but he had no time for any of that right now. He glanced into the side mirror. The gate opening was just visible through the mess of smoke and the faint outline of advancing bodies.

"Get down!" he yelled, then slammed the PDF transport into reverse, and planted his foot through the pedal.

The engine roared and complained as the six huge wheels picked up traction and the transport accelerated into a barely controlled backwards charge. Bota screeched and ducked, dropping the spent autogun into the footwell. The surviving civilians, many of them wounded, were thrown around violently in the back. He could hear them whimpering and cursing. They were practically on top of each other, the transport was meant for ten passengers at most.

Nytus did not hold back. The engine wailed as he kept the pedal firmly pressed against the wall. Bullets flew past, whipping through the air, ricocheting from the bodywork, pinging off of the front grille. Nytus prayed that the engine would hold.

He watched through the mirror as the gate loomed closer, gritting his teeth, his whole body tensed as the steering fought against him, intense pain shooting through his arm. He glimpsed through a gap in the smoke what could only have been the giant body of Private Lander, surrounded by indistinct forms firing from the fume. Nytus' expression changed to one of rage, he roared as he directed the transport straight towards them.

The whole vehicle shook with sickening impacts as bodies were mowed down and caught beneath the wheels. They bumped and shook, and came close to rolling. When Nytus saw the flash of metal either side that indicated they'd cleared the gate, he grit his teeth and pulled on the steering wheel with both hands, attempting to throw the transport into a spin. Bota screamed.

Astea Kress fell to her knees before the creature that stepped out from the core, where blue light crackled and the sounds of distant wind and voices echoed through time and space. The being stepped out of nothingness and into reality as easily as a mortal stepped from one room into another. It spread vast, iridescent wings that filled the corridor, each feather glinted with infinite light and maddening beauty. It's form grew and realigned as it formed in this world, a fearsome, wonderful energy ignited around its body, a manifestation of sorcery, of dazzling blue fire. It's beak was long and deadly sharp, decorated with ridges and patterns and flecks of blinding gold. It's eyes opened and the pools within were unfathomable, black, and brimming with a supreme intelligence, an intellect that grasped concepts that would destroy the mind of a mortal man.

It was satisfied, as the facility burned and fell around it. The artefact, looming in the shaft behind it, the gift from the long-dead ship known as the Hegemon, pulsed and resonated with dimension-tearing power.

This would be a fine seat. A fine foundation from which to begin countless plots and plans and schemes.

Astea smiled as she regarded the creature, her eyes blazing with blue warpfire, her grin almost splitting her face.

"Hail, Sumari'thar," she said, her voice a beguiling chant. "Hail the Lord of Change."

In the corridor outside the core, now blooming with clouds of blue fire and crackling with profane magics, the thing that used to be Sergeant Rozen slumped within the enchanted inferno. Unrecognisable, no longer containing any shred of the man that it was before, the spawn of Sumari'thar was an indescribable tangle of flailing limbs and gaping faces, shining eyes bedecking its warped body. On the left side of the constantly changing mass, a Guard-issue cybernetic arm hung loosely, tendrils of flesh looped and twisted through it's skeletal structure.

Road to Faciilty IX – Northern Arrator Foothills

Pale shafts of sunlight split the clouds, beaming down over the sparkling valley like rippling, golden curtains. The canopy was once again alive with the buzzing of insects and the flapping of wings. They rose up from the trees in great groups, flying away from the facility, backlit by the golden sunrise.

Nytus grimaced as Bota tried to attend to the bullet wound in his arm. He still fought with the steering. The transport complained at every slide, every sharp corner, every incline. The engine sounded weary, and there was a distinct smell of smoke, but he dared not take his foot off the pedal. Not yet.

He glanced over his shoulder, the surviving workers of Facility IX were packed in like livestock. Some sobbed into their hands, others huddled together for comfort, others stared straight ahead blankly, no doubt replaying recent events over and over again in their thoughts. Those who could, were tending to the wounded.

"There," said Bota as she finished cleaning the wound. She sat back in the passenger seat and let out a deep breath. Nytus gave her a curt nod by way of thanks. They shared a look. The girl was relieved, but she was also anxious, scared, and lost.

"Do you think they'll come after us?" she said in a small voice.

"If we're lucky they'll be more interested in what's going on at the facility," he replied grimly. He thought of Rozen, and the others they'd left behind. He cursed and bashed the steering wheel, jarring his wounded arm and causing the pain to flare up again. He saw that Bota was still staring at him, a lost girl in way over her head, and he tried to calm himself.

"As long as this engine keeps going, we should be able to get back to the outpost," he said, his voice more reassuring than before. "There are allies there."

He looked South over the range, to where the hive city gleamed on the sparkling horizon, its spires glinting in the morning light. The skies over the jungles were so alive with flocks of birds. He remembered Sergeant Rozen's vague talk of a planet-wide invasion. It seemed so hard to believe now, it seemed so odd that the vox-caster had been unable to pick up anything from anywhere else on the planet. He wondered whether there was an invasion at all. It hurt his head to think about it.

He could not shake the feeling that something hugely suspicious was going on, and that Six-Zero-Two had been dropped right into the middle of it.

Bota closed her eyes.

"I hope I never hear anything about that place ever again," she commented, sinking into the damaged upholstery of the seat. "I'm glad it's over..."

Nytus looked into the side mirror and saw the unnatural, monstrous, coiling tower of smoke, blossoming skyward and dominating the horizon. It was difficult to tell thanks to the distance and the vibrations caused by the truck's struggling engine, but it seemed that the whole looming cloud was uplit with a strange, ethereal blue. Nytus narrowed his eyes.

"Something tells me this thing is far from over," he said, a grim expression on his face and a dark look in his eye.

The wounded PDF transport followed the track into the deep jungles, out of the Arrator Foothills, back to civilisation. Nytus watched the sun rise, but he felt no hope, only dread followed him from Facility IX.